NBWM3 Hawaii Vacation Day 1

Greg and I traveled to Hawaii with my parents and my brother and his wife. We made this vacation by the generosity of my parents, what a blessing that my parents want to have family trips. We met at my parents' home and loaded up the limo for the ride to the airport at too early in the morning.

The flight to Oahu, Hawaii was a long one. It's the longest flight I've been on and I was concerned about how my body would adjust to such a long flight, a total of 9 hours. With iPad in hand, the time moved quickly, more so that I thought it would. Greg was prepared on his iPad with the first season of Mad Men to watch. We both had books on the iBook app to read, lots of games and pictures to play with (I like color splash app because it allows you to grey in sections to make other colors pop).

On the flight, across from us, there was a lady with a baby on board. She explained how she and her son and her friend were on their way to Guam, a military base. They were going there to surprise their husbands and to introduce her husband for the first time to his son, who just turned 4 months. She lived in Mississippi and seemed like a really sweet person. We wished them safe travels as we landed in Hawaii.

Once we left the gate, we were greeted with double fresh purple orchid leis. This was a service that I told Dad about and thought he might want, because the person who greets you will also bring you to baggage claim areas and show you where to get the rental vehicles. And.. hey... being greeted in Hawaii with Aloha and leis - what couldn't be more perfect? The lady who greeted us said there were over 300 orchids per lei - they were beautiful! She also gave us silk leis. We took pictures and smiled, even though we were weary from travels.

Once we took the bus to the return car place, Greg asked, "Did anyone tip the lady?" Oh my gosh, in our rush to get the luggage and catch the bus to bring us to the rental location, nobody gave the lady a tip. I felt so bad about that, because she was very friendly and kind.

The two cars that Dad rented for the Oahu island: Lincoln Towncar, which Greg drove and my parents came with us. R&R drove the convertible, but I think they only put the top down once during the trip because the sun was beating down too much. I liked the license plates.

Instead of staying at the ever popular and very populated Waikiki, we drove to the North shore of Oahu and stayed at:

Nani Kai Hale ''Beautiful Beach House'' The beach house is right on the water, 2 stories, 3 bedrooms, 3 baths, full kitchen – all very nicely decorated on the inside. Greg said, “They spent a lot of money decorating the place.”

But the outside? Dad said it needed a fresh coat of paint and don’t get the group started about the dangerous driveway. Someone needs to cut back on the plants for either side of the driveway, because pulling out was nearly impossible. Someone had to stand off the side on the road to tell the driver when it was safe to back out!

That night, Greg and I walked the beach, taking pictures. Greg said, “Take a picture as I touch my first lava rock!” It’s not the soft sand that you think of at the gulf shores (but with the oil spill, I don’t even want to go there…) The sand on the North shore in Oahu had small rocks and it was wise to walk into the water with water shoes. But what else could one expect, it’s Hawaii – ummm, volcano anyone?

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